Another version that could be called "Chicago style pizza" is a hot dog pizza "dragged through the garden" with yellow mustard, chopped white onions, bright green sweet pickle relish, a dill pickle spear, tomato slices or wedges, pickled sport peppers and a dash of celery salt, on a poppy seed crust. And never never never with tomato sauce.

And that's just to mimic one of our iconic foods. I'm sure others can come up with a "Chicago style pizza" that pays homage to other characteristics of our city, such as the winter weather, the corruption, the sports teams, and on and on.

For years I have been ordering Sausage and Cheese. To me this was always the great combination.

my pet peeve is people who order anything "and cheese" on their pizza. My hope is that someone gives you a pizza with no sauce or crust when you do that. Afterall, you didn't ask for sauce or crust when you made your order. I know that shouldn't upset me, but it absolutely drives me nuts. Like nails on a chalkboard.

Anichini Bros sausage + giardinera is the gold standard for pizza toppings in my opinion. Italian beef doesn't seem to survive the oven baking process as well but can be sublime under the right conditions.

shakes wrote:my pet peeve is people who order anything "and cheese" on their pizza. My hope is that someone gives you a pizza with no sauce or crust when you do that. Afterall, you didn't ask for sauce or crust when you made your order. I know that shouldn't upset me, but it absolutely drives me nuts. Like nails on a chalkboard.

So when a customer orders plain cheese, do they just say the size? There's no way to avoid redundancy there under your zero tolerance model. Many menus are structured as "[Form of] Crust Cheese Pizza" with additional toppings just added to it. When ordering carry-out, I don't know about you, but strictly from the menu verbatim is a pretty good strategy.

I embrace the "cheese and [toppings]" form of phone ordering. It sounds like you're ordering something better and more plentiful than without including "cheese". If you're sitting at the table speaking with a server, then yes, it would be more of a jerk move. No need to be so transactional in that situation.

shakes wrote:my pet peeve is people who order anything "and cheese" on their pizza. My hope is that someone gives you a pizza with no sauce or crust when you do that. Afterall, you didn't ask for sauce or crust when you made your order. I know that shouldn't upset me, but it absolutely drives me nuts. Like nails on a chalkboard.

So when a customer orders plain cheese, do they just say the size? There's no way to avoid redundancy there under your zero tolerance model. Many menus are structured as "[Form of] Crust Cheese Pizza" with additional toppings just added to it. When ordering carry-out, I don't know about you, but strictly from the menu verbatim is a pretty good strategy.

I embrace the "cheese and [toppings]" form of phone ordering. It sounds like you're ordering something better and more plentiful than without including "cheese". If you're sitting at the table speaking with a server, then yes, it would be more of a jerk move. No need to be so transactional in that situation.

if you're ordering a plain pizza you can say cheese, but if you get any toppings you need to omit the word cheese from the order or else risk a smart ass like me on the other end of the phone following up by asking you if you also want sauce and crust. I used to say that all the time to customers back in my pizza delivery days many decades ago.

nsxtasy wrote:Another version that could be called "Chicago style pizza" is a hot dog pizza "dragged through the garden" with yellow mustard, chopped white onions, bright green sweet pickle relish, a dill pickle spear, tomato slices or wedges, pickled sport peppers and a dash of celery salt, on a poppy seed crust. And never never never with tomato sauce.

And that's just to mimic one of our iconic foods. I'm sure others can come up with a "Chicago style pizza" that pays homage to other characteristics of our city, such as the winter weather, the corruption, the sports teams, and on and on.

Have you ever ordered a Hotdog pizza or was this in jest.

I have tried several 'alternative' pizzas over the years...

A while ago when Q's BBQ had a pizza oven...

Hotlink and BBQ sauce pizza Could of worked but much restraint has to be used as the tangy BBQ sauce overpowered.

Just recently at Monica's Mexican Restaurant (LTH North lunch outing) that also still has a pizza oven...

Chorizo, Steak and Jalapeños pizza in addition to the regular pizza sauce and mozzarella cheese. This was very tasty and I would order it again in a heartbeat.

Some of the other, more common odd, Pineapple and HamChicken with White Sauce

Sometimes they work, sometimes not.

"Very good... but not my favorite." ~ Johnny Depp as Roux the Gypsy in Chocolat

To me, Chicago style pizza is a D'Amato's corner slice with sausage, onions, bell peppers, and mushrooms. Crunchy brown crust, airy dough, the way the light serving of cheese kind of melts into the bread, just perfection. Not to mention, the cheap price! It's one of the things I miss the most when I'm out of town.

In its older incarnation, The Candlelight featured an Italian beef pizza. Back then, they made an ultra thin crust pie (you could almost see through the crust). I think they were in competition with Buckets o Suds for the thinnest crust "tavern style" pizza in town. The beef pizza was covered edge to edge with whole slices of IB (made in house). The pizza was delicious, but the solid beef covering made it look like an unappetizing brownish gray mess. Still, I often wondered why Italian beef was not a more popular topping in Chicago, especially since many places that sell pizzas also make beefs.

I'd say sausage, mushroom, onion and green pepper is my 'classic.' You sometimes see it deliciously called SMOG.

I've never had Italian beef pizza. My concern has always been that the beef would be lost with the tomato and cheese plus the usual giardiniera and bread/crust (Chicken pizzas, too). I'll bet it's good at Vito & Nicks, though.

Based on how many local places offer it as a default combination, I think sausage, mushroom, onion & green pepper is definitely a Chicago thing but in general, I'm not a fan. Unless they're handled exceptionally well, these vegetables leech of lot of moisture into the pizza when they cook, diluting its flavor and soggifying the entire affair.

The few places where I order vegetables on my pizza are places I know cook them first and/or slice them very thin, both of which reduce their negative effects on the pizza. And even then, I generally stick to one vegetable (usually onion or jalapeno) per pizza.

Three vegetables and one meat on a pizza?! Now, that's just silly. After all, it's not a salad!

=R=

Gardening is a bloodsport --Meghan Kleeman

Why don't you take these profiteroles and put them up your shi'-ta-holes? --Jemaine & Bret

BrendanR wrote:I'd say sausage, mushroom, onion and green pepper is my 'classic.' You sometimes see it deliciously called SMOG.

I've never had Italian beef pizza. My concern has always been that the beef would be lost with the tomato and cheese plus the usual giardiniera and bread/crust (Chicken pizzas, too). I'll bet it's good at Vito & Nicks, though.

Yeah, at Vito & Nicks, we always get one Italian beef & giard pizza (which works far better than I ever thought it would) and one classic Chicago combo (sausage, mushrooms, green peppers, onions.) I haven't heard it called SMOG around here; usually it's just called a "[insert name of pizza joint] special," though some local places have cute names for it. At Pizza Castle, it's a "King Arthur," for example. As ronniesuburban mentions, though, it depends on the pizza place whether I order the special or not. Some places it's just too heavy and too wet for the crust, so I'll go for plain sausage or sausage and mushroom at those places. At Vito & Nicks, though, they seem to do a fine job with those ingredients without making the pizza a big floppy mess.

To me, either a plain sausage or the "special" combo of sausage, mushrooms, green peppers, and onions are the quintessential Chicago toppings. Beef and giard feels a bit more "specialty" to me, for whatever reason.

Binko wrote:Some places it's just too heavy and too wet for the crust, so I'll go for plain sausage or sausage and mushroom at those places. At Vito & Nicks, though, they seem to do a fine job with those ingredients without making the pizza a big floppy mess.

I have also seen a wet crust at most places trying to do SMOG. A local exception is...

The first time I was at Zaffiro's on Farwell in Milwaukee, I asked the bartender what to order. He said sausage (homemade) and pepperoni. After getting my pie, I fully understood. This is a beautiful thin crusted pizza. The water that veggies emit would be a horror on this pizza. If you get a chance, go there and get this. You will be real happy.

ronnie_suburban wrote:Based on how many local places offer it as a default combination, I think sausage, mushroom, onion & green pepper is definitely a Chicago thing but in general, I'm not a fan. Unless they're handled exceptionally well, these vegetables leech of lot of moisture into the pizza when they cook, diluting its flavor and soggifying the entire affair.

The few places where I order vegetables on my pizza are places I know cook them first and/or slice them very thin, both of which reduce their negative effects on the pizza. And even then, I generally stick to one vegetable (usually onion or jalapeno) per pizza.

=R=

Completely agree on this. If you aren't going to pre-cook the vegetables, you shouldn't offer them as a topping. It should be against the law .

Raw, high water content vegetables will only result in a wet, terrible pizza. IMO, this is fundamental. If a restaurant is going to focus on one dish, as most Chicago pizza joints do, how can you be so lazy to omit this step on your pizza?

I'd somehow completely missed the Italian Beef and Giard. pizza. Is the beef not overcooked to hardness during the baking process? Or, is "crispy Italian Beef" a delicacy I've been missing all these years?

Puckjam wrote:The first time I was at Zaffiro's on Farwell in Milwaukee, I asked the bartender what to order. He said sausage (homemade) and pepperoni. After getting my pie, I fully understood. This is a beautiful thin crusted pizza. The water that veggies emit would be a horror on this pizza. If you get a chance, go there and get this. You will be real happy.

Yeah, Zaffiro's is definitely a place where a heavily-ladened (and wet) pie would be much too much for the crust. That's a truly thin and crackery pizza.

chicagojim wrote:I'd somehow completely missed the Italian Beef and Giard. pizza. Is the beef not overcooked to hardness during the baking process?

You know, that is what I would have thought, but, no, I've never had any textural issues with it. Mind you, I only get it at V&N's (sometimes with sausage in the mix, too, for a pizza version of an Italian beef combo), but it's thin enough that it doesn't feel rubbery or chewy.

I have to agree on the amount of veggies with sausage on a pizza should be minimal. I only go with one veggie/sausage combo at a time. Sausage and onion is my go to but I do like a sausage and green pepper occasionally. Will also go sausage and mushroom but only if the shrooms are not of the canned variety.

metro man wrote:I have to agree on the amount of veggies with sausage on a pizza should be minimal. I only go with one veggie/sausage combo at a time. Sausage and onion is my go to but I do like a sausage and green pepper occasionally. Will also go sausage and mushroom but only if the shrooms are not of the canned variety.

I don't know if it's nostalgia or what, but when I go to Villa Nova in Stickney, they actually give you a choice of fresh or canned mushrooms, no difference in price. I choose canned for some reason. That's the only time I could stand those damned things.

Binko wrote:I don't know if it's nostalgia or what, but when I go to Villa Nova in Stickney, they actually give you a choice of fresh or canned mushrooms, no difference in price. I choose canned for some reason. That's the only time I could stand those damned things.

I’ve been known to order 1/2 mushroom and 1/2 mushroom there.

"Very good... but not my favorite." ~ Johnny Depp as Roux the Gypsy in Chocolat